The "Little Green Defender" Story.

[Gramps]

Always good to have a few spare sets of tires around....just in case.

Yea cause ya never know when you might have a flat.

 

[JimK]

Yea cause ya never know when you might have a flat.

Exactly!! :ror:

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[JimK]

Interesting find on the Injora shocks. Nice to know that the stock Traxxas springs fit them. The shocks may need to have a little green slime added to the o-rings if they are seeping oil.



I like the looks of them DJ Crawler M/T tires. They may be a good fit for my Defender SVX Spectre build that I just started working on. I'll have to get a set and try them out.

That's what I'm thinking too. I have some on hand but was in a rush to get these shocks ready to install. When I bring the truck home I'll strip the shocks down, clean them good and rebuild them properly.

On a side note the Defender no longer leans to the passenger side under throttle with the firmest Traxxas springs installed.

As for the tires I am very happy with them so far. These were $25 cad for a set of four which I think is pretty reasonable.

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[B-MOW71]

That's what I'm thinking too. I have some on hand but was in a rush to get these shocks ready to install. When I bring the truck home I'll strip the shocks down, clean them good and rebuild them properly.

On a side note the Defender no longer leans to the passenger side under throttle with the firmest Traxxas springs installed.

As for the tires I am very happy with them so far. These were $25 cad for a set of four which I think is pretty reasonable.

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I did add the green slime to my stock TRX4-m shocks and haven't seen any seepage yet.

I ordered a set of them tires yesterday on Amazon. For me here in the States, they were $13.71 and I picked up a set of alum wheels for $18 bucks. I was shocked to see the price of the tires! Thanks for the info and can't wait to try them out.

 

[Natedog]

Interesting find on the Injora shocks. Nice to know that the stock Traxxas springs fit them. The shocks may need to have a little green slime added to the o-rings if they are seeping oil.

I like the looks of them DJ Crawler M/T tires. They may be a good fit for my Defender SVX Spectre build that I just started working on. I'll have to get a set and try them out.

Agreed, also tiny shocks are easy to overfill and will then purge the excess somewhere. On my TF2, I found that some 3k diff oil was the best.


Both sets of tires look great, the DJ Crawler MT tires look like old Axial Trepadors, an under-rated great tire imo. Love the white spoke wheels, but they look great on the silver Defender style rims too! 8)

 

[JimK]

Agreed, also tiny shocks are easy to overfill and will then purge the excess somewhere. On my TF2, I found that some 3k diff oil was the best.


Both sets of tires look great, the DJ Crawler MT tires look like old Axial Trepadors, an under-rated great tire imo. Love the white spoke wheels, but they look great on the silver Defender style rims too! 8)

Thanks Natedog and good point about overfilling the shocks. I did actually overfill a couple of them and tried to dip the corner of a napkin in them to remove the excess oil. There's a good chance they still had a bit too much oil in them?

 

[JimK]

I did add the green slime to my stock TRX4-m shocks and haven't seen any seepage yet.

I ordered a set of them tires yesterday on Amazon. For me here in the States, they were $13.71 and I picked up a set of alum wheels for $18 bucks. I was shocked to see the price of the tires! Thanks for the info and can't wait to try them out.

You're quite welcome and I hope the new tires work out good for you. I'm pretty happy with mine.

 

[JimK]

Some changes coming soon to the little green Defender.

Got a set of AX Speed aluminum front and rear bumpers. These appear to be very well machined and came with aluminum chassis brace/bumper mounts too. It also came with a set of led light for the front bumper but I won't be installing those.

The rear bumper came with a trailer hitch that mounts in the center of the bumper. This places it higher than the Traxxas hitch which mounts down below the bumper. Most likely I will not be installing the trailer hitch, not now anyway.

I also have an Injora carbon fiber LCG chassis kit that I'll be throwing under this thing as well. It will be interesting to see how it compares to the Furitek chassis I put on the Bronco.

I also ordered a set of Injora brass +3mm wheel hexes. I believe the hexes on there now are +2mm wider than stock but I mostly ordered these for the wheel nuts. Wasn't able to track a set of them down separately. Got a busy week ahead so I'm not sure when I'll get around to mounting this stuff up but I'll be sure to keep you posted.

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[OSRC]

Very nice! Those bumpers look pretty decent.

Looking at all the available mods (Like that carbon chassis) and the substantially lower prices for 1/18 stuff, I'm debating a second M to go wild on. Very happy with my baby Defender so far.

 

[Gramps]

Is there reason why the Injora chassis is in 2 pieces? Seems it would be stronger if all one piece.

 

[JimK]

Very nice! Those bumpers look pretty decent.

Looking at all the available mods (Like that carbon chassis) and the substantially lower prices for 1/18 stuff, I'm debating a second M to go wild on. Very happy with my baby Defender so far.

Ya the 18th scale stuff seems to be pretty popular right now and they are quite capable little rigs and as you mentioned pretty reasonably price if you don't go carazy on mods....but who does that?? :shock::lmao:

Is there reason why the Injora chassis is in 2 pieces? Seems it would be stronger if all one piece.

I'm not sure but I think it could be to provide some "taper" without bending the rails as much. The Furitek chassis I put on my Bronco was sort of pinched at the ends using threaded tube and small screws. I didn't like how much pressure these tiny screws were under to keep the chassis tapered. Again, this is only a guess on my part?

 

[JimK]

Got the chassis and bumpers installed last night. I haven't had a chance to test drive it yet but it's all back together and ready to go.

Here's the chassis rails assembled and held in place with the new aluminum bumper mounts. Fit and finish is good on the carbon fiber frame rails and the bumper mounts. I did need to lightly file the notches at each end of the frame rails for the bumper mounts to fit into the notches. Otherwise no issues.

I dropped the guts out of the stock frame rails and was pretty much able to keep it all together except for a couple of the suspension link ends.

Got the skid mounted and all the links back in place and the driveshafts are back on. So far everything has assembled nicely and has fit in place with no issues.

Sitting as a roller now with the bumpers installed and the wider wheel hexes installed as well. I put the white spoke wheels back on for now for a little change. Still need to put in the battery tray and the esc. The chassis kit came with some nice heavy duty velcro to mount the esc.

All back together and ready to go. Need to adjust the shocks a little to get it sitting level again. I also need to put the tow shackles back on. They need to be opened up a little to fit on the new bumpers. Hopefully I will get a test drive in tonight if it isn't raining.

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[JimK]

I got the tow shackles back on tonight. Needed to tickle them a bit with a small file to widen the opening a little bit.

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[2471:24]

I’d love to see a video of this crawling!

 

[JimK]

I’d love to see a video of this crawling!

I have a few short videos of this and my other rigs in action but I haven't figured out how to post them here. I'll work on it and try to get a couple short clips up.

 

[2471:24]

Sweet, thank you.

 

[JimK]

Added a few scale items to the Defender last night. Still have some room on the rack for a couple more things. I'm going to look in my parts bin and see if I've got anything else kicking around?

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[JimK]

I decided to take the spare tire off off the back for now and relocate it.

Ummm....no!!

Popped it up on the roof rack for now. I know it's more weight up high but I've already come to grips with the fact that this rig is a trail truck and I want to make it look the part. I may leave it there....I may not??

I used a zip tie to hold in place up there. Plenty secure.

I'm going to put a Jerry can on the back where the spare tire used to be. I might redo the rope on the back too. I think it looks a little too big compared to the truck. What do you think?

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[Gramps]

Tire on the hood looks good but would make it real hard to see when driving. ;-)

 

[JimK]

Tire on the hood looks good but would make it real hard to see when driving. ;-)

That's what I was thinking too. I do have smaller tires that I might try up there?

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